


let's waste time chasing cars

by sorbusaucuparias



Series: these things will never change [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: "let's waste time getting cockblocked", AU, F/M, Mentions of other characters who don't say anything, Pretty Stydia-centric, Sarcastic fluff smut, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-10
Updated: 2015-08-10
Packaged: 2018-04-13 23:57:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4542414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sorbusaucuparias/pseuds/sorbusaucuparias
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Take a ride with me, Martin?”</p><p>The bastard actually cocks an eyebrow when her eyes meet his. His smirk grows while her scowl becomes more prominent. The tequila’s still flowing through her, she’s still tapping her foot against the concrete only now it’s to ward off numbness, and Lydia’s making a list in her head of the advantages of walking home.</p><p>The number one advantage? Not being anywhere near Stiles Stilinski.</p>
            </blockquote>





	let's waste time chasing cars

**Author's Note:**

> remember, don't play mean pranks on people or drink excessively, always make sure you have a safe way home from a party and always be safe - this will make more sense when you read on.

It’s said that there are two certainties in life: death and taxes.

In Beacon Hills, there’s three certainties: death, taxes and someone from the Cyclones lacrosse team’s first-line throwing a party on a Saturday night. Each party is different in a few aspects but by the end of the night they all look exactly the same: people stumble out of the house, couples group each other against innocent trees and someone hunches over to throw up in the gutter while they cry. Technically, Lydia thinks that could count as a fourth certainty. But she’s not trying to get tangled up in technicalities because she’s focused on certainties at that particular moment.

Certain: The sun will rise.

Probable: Lydia will wake up the Sunday following one of these parties sometime _after_ the sun rises.

And uncertain?

Well, what is completely uncertain, verging on impossible, and threatening to ruin her understanding of the very simple concept of probability, is the idea that Lydia Martin could find herself standing alone outside Danny Mahealani’s house by the end of the night.

Yet, she finds herself tapping her heel impatiently on the concrete and furiously typing a message to Allison, who Lydia knows has the common courtesy to at least tell her she’s leaving with her boyfriend before actually leaving Lydia alone at a party. She holds this belief as she types out her third text message to Allison, the tapping of her heel become hastier when a cool gust of wind blows along the road and a shiver rolls down her spine.

There’s still no response as the set of headlights illuminate the street. Lydia knows whose vehicle it is without having to look away from her screen. So she doesn’t. She won’t give him the satisfaction of admitting that she is alone, across town from her house, with no money in her wallet and a phone that has 2% battery life left. She would rather call her mother and listen to her complaints about being woken from her sleep because Lydia doesn’t have the sense to plan ahead before she leaves the house. Lydia did in fact plan ahead but that plan had disappeared when her best friend had.

The vehicle rolls to a stop. She can hear the passenger side window being rolled down, the music from the radio cuts through the pleasant sound of nothingness on the road. It’s obnoxious. _He’s_ obnoxious. Lydia will not look up from her screen and validate his obnoxious behaviour. There is a plethora of actions Lydia would do before validating him and that smug smirk of his that she _knows_ he is wearing without ever having to look away from her screen.

Then he suggests it and Lydia’s head snaps up involuntarily, a scowl setting itself on her lips.

“Take a ride with me, Martin?”

The bastard actually cocks an eyebrow when her eyes meet his. His smirk grows while her scowl becomes more prominent. The tequila’s still flowing through her, she’s still tapping her foot against the concrete only now it’s to ward off numbness, and Lydia’s making a list in her head of the advantages of walking home.

The number one advantage? Not being anywhere near Stiles Stilinski.

“Pass,” she says, sliding her now dead phone into her bag as she does, before folding her arms against her chest.

“You would rather die of hypothermia than admit that you need my help?”

Rage flickers in her eyes. Her nostrils actually flare. But then she calms herself because there is no way she is doing this with him in the middle of an otherwise quiet street.

Instead, Lydia scrunches up her nose slightly and tilts her head towards him. “The effects of hypothermia can only begin to set in when the core body temperature begins to fall below 95°.”

“And alcohol in the bloodstream has the ability to _increase_ the risk of hypothermia because it causes vasodilation,” Stiles retorts. She wants to smack herself for the way her jaw drops slightly because all that does is preserve the smirk that he’s wearing. Maybe she wants to smack him. That maybe quickly turns into a definitely when he leans over the passenger seat and adds, “You’re not the only one who reads.”

But her phone’s dead, there’s no one left from the party and Danny’s not in his own house because he decided to be an honourable host and drive some of the drunkest attendees home.

So, Lydia lets out an unimpressed huff and closes the space between herself and the Jeep. She doesn’t allow herself to wobble when she walks over; he’s still wearing that smirk of his, she won’t do anything to enable its continuation.

The Jeep still smells the same, like sweaty lacrosse gear and Stiles, but is considerably cleaner than the last time she had reluctantly sat in it. At least then, she had Allison to talk to in the back and Stiles had Scott and they weren’t faced with the possibility of social interaction with each other.

It’s only after she buckles her belt that she notices his gaze is still on her, his lips still curled up in that smirk that makes her want to stamp on his foot. Lydia turns her head in his direction. “What?”

“I’m waiting for those two magic words.”

Lydia thinks for a moment, wets her lips then leans over to get her face close to his. “Bite me.”

“ _Thank you_ ,” he replies with a roll of his eyes.

“You’re welcome,” she says, condescendingly patting him on the cheek before moving back to rest against the passenger seat.

Stiles’ eyes narrow slightly as he stares at her. Finally, he seemingly forfeits and shakes his head in disbelief, turning his attention back to the road. “ _God_ , alcohol makes you more annoying. I have got to remember that.”

Her eyes flutter shut for a brief moment while her back moves against the passenger seat in an attempt to get comfortable. When she opens her eyes again, Stiles is almost at her house. That brief moment seems to have been longer than she thought. Lydia keeps the pretence of being asleep, though, closing her eyes enough that if Stiles glances over at her, he’ll think she’s still sleeping. Him looking over is completely unlikely, she knows that, but pretending to be sleeping is better than the alternative.

He’s softly tapping his fingers against the steering wheel in time with whatever song is on the radio; in an entirely unlike him move, he’s actually turned the volume down in an attempt not to wake her. The last time she asked him to turn it down, he broke the knob trying to amplify the volume to its highest. Lydia won in the end because he had to go to the mechanic and found out his entire exhaust system had to be replaced; there was an actual skip in her step that entire week.

So, him having the volume turned down is a bad sign.

She knows he hasn’t been drinking because he has an annoying habit of talking in haikus when he has. Lydia has no idea how he manages to do it but it happens every, single time; more so when he's been drinking gin than any other spirit. Still, she knows what he's like when he's drunk.

She knows he hasn’t been smoking because his fingers aren’t covered in peanut butter. She’s watched him finish an entire jar of it then clean it out with his tongue on three separate occasions.

She knows he hasn’t gotten laid because, while he has a tendency to be nicer to her when he has, he isn’t humming a song that’s remotely close to a classic rock ballad. He isn’t humming at all, he’s just tapping his fingers on the steering wheel as he waits for the light to turn green.

For a moment – it’s a brief, brief fleeting moment that passes her without leaving a forwarding address – Lydia thinks that he turned the radio down because he likes her. But that thought passes her by quickly.

Stiles and Lydia don’t like each other.

They barely tolerate each other.

The last time they spoke to each other and there was no sarcastic quips or eye rolls was somewhere between freshman and sophomore year. It might have been her birthday, the last one where her parents still retained the illusion of a happy marriage before it crumbled and the ink on the divorce papers dried and her father moved across the country to start a new life. All Lydia knows on the subject (and she won’t ever admit this because she would then be admitting that she doesn’t have all the answers) is that the first day of sophomore year, he had grown out his hair and she had started wearing shorter skirts and they were no longer friends.

He was the one who made the first sarcastic quip. She was the first one who rolled her eyes. And that was that.

So, him having the volume turned down is _definitely_ a bad sign.

But she doesn’t question it. Instead, she sighs softly, shifts in her seat a little and keeps up the pretence that she’s still asleep. Lydia catches his gaze drift over to her, his expression no longer obnoxious but something that her intoxicated brain can’t properly define, before he goes back to staring at the road.

When they finally arrive outside her house, Lydia expects him to push her shoulder to wake her up. She expects a witty remark that will take her an embarrassing amount of time to respond to because she’s drowsy and desperate for support that isn’t the scratchy seat of his Jeep.

Stiles doesn’t nudge her shoulder or call out her name.

He takes the key out of the ignition, gets out and then, when he gets to her side and opens the door, unbuckles her seat belt so he can scoop her into her arms. Somehow, he manages to shut the passenger door while also wrapping her arms around his neck. Lydia knows that she should open her eyes and tell him she’s perfectly capable of walking without assistance.

But there’s something nice about being carried. She feels protected like nothing bad can happen to her and she can’t remember the last time another person made her feel protected. It’s usually all her; the walls she’s built around her can withstand any calamity.

Lydia can protect herself.

She has to.

Still, there’s a comfort in having someone provide a feeling of protection that is akin to the sensation she has when she wears her favorite shade of lipstick and her heels clack on the linoleum of the school hallway. Lydia doesn’t even think Jackson made her feel that way.

Which is why she intertwines her fingers behind his neck and softly nudges her head against his chest. Stiles doesn’t know she’s awake, he’s not even looking at her, he’s too focused on walking up the stairs and _not_ smacking her legs against the wall. It’s so quiet in the house, all Lydia can hear is the sound of their breathing, it’s almost in sync, and when her head moves against his chest again and her ear presses to his chest, she thinks she can hear his heart beating. She thinks it’s beating faster than it should but she doesn’t have the time, or the mental ability in her state, to investigate it further.

Stiles is putting her down on her bed. The comfort and protection she had felt disappearing as he does. Her eyes open completely – there’s no light and therefore no possibility for him to realize she’s actually awake – so she can watch as his figure moves around the room, arms outstretched, to look for something.

A blanket.

He’s searching for a blanket.

 _Stiles Stilinski_ is searching for a blanket for _Lydia Martin_.

And he finds one, which he then drapes over her. In any other circumstance, if she wasn’t drunk, he would most likely throw her on the bed and leave, spouting snarky remarks as he did. Actually, he wouldn’t have been carrying her in the first place. Lydia wouldn’t have gotten in his Jeep either.

They don’t care about each other anymore. They’re adversaries, equipped in snark-to-snark combat. But she misses when they weren’t.

She also misses when they didn’t live in the same house, when their rooms were not almost _directly_ opposite each other.

The Sheriff and her mother moving in together only increased the antagonistic behaviour between Stiles and Lydia.

Behaviour she _knows_ will continue because the minute her eyes close and she falls asleep, she realizes she won’t remember anything after getting into the Jeep.

 

* * *

 

Someone’s banging pots and pans together in the kitchen.

It’s not her headache – because she’s Lydia Martin and she does _not_ get hangovers – that’s making her over exaggerate the sound. There is someone _literally_ banging pots and pans together in her kitchen and she can’t make the noise go away when she covers her head with her pillow. So, after changing out of the dress she woke up in and into something casual that didn’t state she fell asleep in last night’s clothes as well as wiping away the remnants of make-up, Lydia walks down into the kitchen to see Stiles drop the pots and pans on to the counter with a shit-eating grin on his face.

“Good morning, sunshine.”

She ignores him. She goes straight to the refrigerator to look for the coldest bottle of water they have. Stiles hops on island’s countertop and grabs an apple.

“Sleep well?” he questions in a tone of faux concern, before biting into an apple.

Lydia continues to stare into the refrigerator even after she takes a bottle, leaning in and enjoying the way the chill sweeps over her. “I did until _someone_ decided to do a substandard imitation of a cymbal-banging monkey toy.”

“ _Weird_.” It’s said through a mouth full of half-masticated apple that has her turning around to face him, only to see him holding the apple between his teeth as he frames her face with his fingers, squinting slightly as he does. When her mouth begins to open, retort ready to roll off her tongue, Stiles uses one of his hands to remove to apple between his teeth before pointing at her with the other. “I was right. You definitely _could_ be on the poster for discouraging excessive drinking.”

“It wasn’t _excessive_ ,” Lydia retorts immaturely, which makes his shit-eating grin return. She rolls her eyes as she shuts the refrigerator door, before she rounds the island to sit on one of the stools.

Stiles pushes himself off the countertop, throwing his hands in the air when he sticks the landing. There’s an expectant look in his eyes, eyebrows raised, when he turns back to face her. Even after she’s taken a drink of water, the look remains.

“What?”

“Where’s my ‘thank you’ for hauling my ass over to Danny’s last night?”

“Bite me.”

“Try again.”

Lydia pretends to be contemplating it while she takes another sip of water. With a sweet smile plastered on her face, she leans toward him. “Eat me.”

There’s a pause, one that seems to go for a nonsensically long time, before Stiles waggles his eyebrows. “Your room or mine?”

The backdoor opens before Lydia can reply with anything other than a glare. Natalie walks in, followed by the Sheriff, in the middle of a conversation, shopping bags in hand. Their conversation comes to an abrupt halt when they see Stiles and Lydia, they’re almost surprised that they’re there despite both of them living in the house.

The Sheriff puts his shopping bag on the counter and points to the pots and pans Stiles left strewn beside the sink. “What are those?”

Stiles says “pots” at the same time Lydia says “pans”. Their eyes meet for a brief moment before Stiles takes a bite of his apple and walks out from behind the island.

“Well, I’m out of here,” Stiles declares with a wave of his hand. “Lydia, text me when you decide to play nice.”

Her eyes roll of their own volition. The smile on his face as he says it makes her exceedingly ecstatic that she can’t remember the ride home. Lydia can only imagine what he must have been like.

 

* * *

 

“I’m sorry,” are the first words Allison utters when Lydia sees her on Monday morning. She’s waiting next to Lydia’s locker, leaning against the wall of lockers next to it.

Lydia begins opening her locker before looking over at Allison. “It’s fine.”

Because it is. Lydia’s moved on from being annoyed about it. Annoyance wastes time and Lydia has too much to plan to waste time feeling something as mundane as annoyance. Like her retaliation for the way Stiles decided to wake her up the previous day.

“We left you at Danny’s.”

“I found my way home.”

“Stiles?”

Her lips purse momentarily before she glances over from the contents of her locker to Allison. “Sadly.”

Allison smiles. A laugh soon following. “When you go away to college, you won’t see him daily--”

“Can you repeat that?” Lydia interrupts, midway through taking out a textbook. “And say it slower, so I can appreciate it.”

“You’ll miss him when you don’t see him daily,” Allison continues after rolling her eyes.

Which, for some unknown reason, strikes a chord with her. It’s something she covers immediately, replacing it with the sound her locker makes when it shuts, and tries to walk away from, linking her arm with Allison’s as they walk to English. But it comes back when she’s sitting in her seat, writing notes about the book they’re currently reading, and he’s sitting right next to her, doodling in the margins of his notebook because his scribbled shorthand of the notes makes sense to only him.

That’s a lie, though. Lydia can decipher his shorthand. Scott too.

She can delude herself into thinking that she won’t miss Stiles but she will.

Lydia thinks it’s because there’s something she can’t figure out. Something about _him_ that she’s _never_ been able to understand. It’s not about them going from friends to sardonic opponents, something she will comprehend at some point once she gains all the facts she’s missing from Stiles. It’s whatever makes him (at least in the deepest recesses of her mind) an unanswered riddle, an unarranged Rubik’s cube, a jigsaw puzzle without a piece. That’s what he is when he encompasses Lydia’s thoughts.

It’s not even the simplest facts about him that have her perplexed. She has an exceptional knowledge of every rudimentary fact regarding Stiles Stilinski, so much so that she could pen a guide called ‘The A-Z of Stilinski’, that not even losing him as one of her closest friends can erase. Lydia knows his first name, which less than five people do.

It’s whatever’s underneath; that’s what she’ll miss. Not him.

Especially not when he catches her eyes on him and proceeds to wink at her followed by an over the top lick of his top lip. Her gaze quickly transforms into a scowl.

 _Definitely_ not him.

 

* * *

 

 _Mucuna pruriens_ ; a common ingredient in itching powder.

What else?

_Rose hips._

Not exactly mature and exceptionally clever by her standards but it accomplishes what she wanted it to.

Stiles looks like he belongs on a car dashboard as he tries to scratch his head without using his hands. She had covered the inside of his lacrosse helmet before the game, under the guise of wishing Scott good luck, accompanying Allison when she went. At first, Stiles seemed to think it was just a normal occurrence, his nose scrunching up every so often as he tried to will it away. After the second quarter, Stiles began shaking his head vigorously, resulting in Coach Finstock yelling at him to change his intimidation tactic.

By the last quarter, Stiles knows who’s responsible, judging by the glare he sends Lydia every so often, and she has to press the back of her hand against her mouth to stifle her laughter every time he does.

The Cyclones win. _Obviously_.

It’s possible that Stiles scores the final goal to spite her.

It’s definite when he turns around and finds her face first in the crowd, cocking his head to the side when he does, before being overrun by the rest of the team in a congratulatory group hug.

From her place on the stands, Lydia can see his sigh of relief when he finally takes his helmet off and is able to scratch his head. He’s like a dog who’s contracted fleas, even scratching his head as he follows the team off the field to the locker room. Lydia honestly feels bad for it, so she pushes through the masses of people to catch up with him. Stiles is straggling behind the rest of them, nodding his head absently to whatever animated conversation is happening between Scott and Liam, when Lydia wraps her fingers around the hand not scratching at his hair. Surprise etches itself on his face before he turns his head to see it’s her and annoyance takes over.

“Stop scratching.” Lydia accentuates her statement by reaching up to pull Stiles’ hand from his hair, despite the sound of frustration that falls from his lips. “A cold shower is the only way to fix it.”

He starts to say something, mouth opening, annoyance shifting, but he stops himself and nods instead. Judging by the way he clenches his free hand and grips onto the helmet that’s inside made him itchy in the first place, it seems like it’s a difficult problem for him but he manages to keep his hands from his hair. At least until entering the school, when he’s finally out of her gaze.

That should be it.

Lydia hadn’t planned anything further than watching him fidget on the lacrosse field in her retribution for every immature prank he had pulled that she hadn’t responded to. She was even going to leave after the game was over, getting a ride home with the Sheriff before he went to work.

So, finding herself sitting on the hood of the Jeep, waiting for Stiles and texting the Sheriff that she can find her own way home with a ‘thank you’ attached, is a completely unplanned action. Lydia can’t even comprehend her reasoning behind it but she thinks it’s because she wants to make sure that Stiles is alright. It’s a strange feeling to say the least.

Stiles is running his fingers through now soaking wet hair when he notices her. He tries to ignore her, throwing his lacrosse gear into the back of the Jeep without saying anything, even putting the key in the ignition, letting the engine slowly roar to life, while Lydia absently checks her text messages on the hood. Eventually, Stiles rounds the Jeep to stare at her and she finally puts her phone down to meet his eye.

“What?”

“Itching powder?!” His voice reaches an octave that Lydia’s positive can rival Coach’s whistle.

She rolls her eyes, raising her hands to rest on his shoulders before pulling him to turn around. When he tries to walk away, Lydia wraps her legs around his hips with an almost exasperated sigh. Stiles doesn’t even try to pull away from her after that. Her fingers roam through his drenched hair. His foot taps against the parking lot’s asphalt.

“What are you doing?” Stiles asks, attempting to turn his head back to look at her only to have Lydia hold it in place.

“An examination.”

For a moment, Lydia actually loses herself in it; the sensation of him between her legs, the feel of his skin under the pads of her fingers, the heavy thumping of her heart that seems to echo in her ears. It makes absolutely no sense to her because she’s only making sure she hasn’t left that him with any permanent damage. Still, there’s something about it that feels incredibly natural, like it’s the way they always are.

She swears she hears his breath hitch. Or maybe it’s hers. Either way, it makes her pull her hands from his hair like the feeling of his scalp against her skin burns.

It’s only when he clears his throat that her legs untangle themselves from around him. There’s an expectant expression on his face, which she waves off. “You’re fine.”

At that, Stiles scoffs before laughing. “I can’t believe you put itching powder in my helmet.”

“And I can’t believe you put the word ‘ _fucker_ ’ in every third sentence of the draft History paper I gave Mr Yukimura,” Lydia retorts, smirking when his laughter disappears. She pushes herself off the hood of the Jeep, patting him on the chest. “ _Please_ , did you really think this was only because of Sunday morning? That’s cute, Stiles. _Really_. It’s adorable and naïve, very unlike you.”

Stiles’ anxious expression quickly transforms, no longer waiting for an angry diatribe from her about how schoolwork is off limits, instead seeing it as a challenge. He leans his hands against the hood, leaning over to meet her eyes, his brow arching as she trails her finger along the edge of the front window.

“What happened to the Lydia Martin who planned flawless pranks?”

“You don’t think itching powder’s flawless?”

“I think it’s a step down for the girl who replaced my Econ textbook for one that looked identical on the outside but had every page written backwards.”

She smirks, her finger stopping its movement along the window so that her hand can lean against the hood of the Jeep. Her stance almost matches Stiles as she leans close to him. “Says the boy who couldn’t think of an astute way to wake me up.”

It isn’t meant to be an incentive but that’s what he takes it as. Stiles leans over further, until their noses almost brush, with a smirk on his face. “Maybe I wasn’t trying to be astute.”

And it happens again.

Lydia finds herself getting lost in it. In everything about it. How their breathing seems to not only be in sync, but seems to have become heavier, their breaths echoing in the almost silent parking lot. How she swears his eyes leave hers to dart to her lips for the briefest second before returning like nothing happened. How she finds herself almost wishing that something had.

“Stiles!”

That brings her straight back. As does the way they both seem to recoil at a rate that should hurt them.

It’s Scott, wide grin spread across his lips, who’s waving to them as he walks over. His walk quickly turns into a sprint, leaving Stiles and Lydia only a few seconds to go back to acting like they normally did. There’s no evidence of how it appeared like they were about to cross a line that they wouldn’t be able to come back from.

For incredibly obvious reasons, they couldn’t do that. Her mother and his father dating and cohabiting being the number one reason. The giant, neon reason that was flashing in her brain while she climbed into the backseat of the Jeep, not even asking Stiles, considering he and Scott were going back to her house anyway.

Lydia has to remind herself, it’s not _her_ house anymore. It’s the Martin-Stilinski house, because the Stilinski house didn’t have enough space for all of them and Stiles and Lydia, while both leaving after graduation, couldn’t spend an entire school year living in the same room. She doesn’t think she’s ever been more grateful that their parents realized that because Lydia can still hear her heartbeat in her ears, the thumping against her chest making it nearly impossible to listen to whatever Stiles and Scott are talking about in the front.

Stiles and Lydia don’t like each other.

They barely tolerate each other.

Whatever happened before Scott’s interruption was nothing more than a chemically-charged anomaly. Lydia knows the important facts regarding their dynamic and that erases the reasons she had been compiling for why she and Stiles couldn’t do anything. The important facts remind her that there is no possibility the Jeep incident was anything more than an irregularity.

A pattern cannot be discerned by a single data point.

 

* * *

 

Somehow over Winter break, the certainty of a party on a Saturday night becomes Stiles and Lydia’s problem. No one else can host it due to various familial restrictions, vacations, etc, and Lydia doesn’t want to be responsible for changing a certainty of Beacon Hills. Stiles, however, takes more convincing because apparently he wants to stay in his cocoon of blankets for the entirety of break, only leaving for food and bathroom breaks. The only way Lydia manages to get his agreement is through a deal to be the only one in charge of the subsequent clean up. It takes _less_ effort for Natalie and the Sheriff to approve.

And for the first hour of the party, Stiles rancorously drifts in and out of conversations and drinks from the plastic cup he’s clutching like a lifeline instead of actually talking. Normally, he’s annoyingly good at this aspect of the party. There have been times when Lydia, being a good person _not_ a friend, has had to drag a drunk yet babbling Stiles from a party because the host wants to clear everyone out but Stiles, being Stiles, wants to continue his conversation.

Lydia keeps her eyes on him as she offers people drinks, making sure that no one has an empty cup unless they want one. She watches Stiles back out of a group of people seamlessly and begin weaving his way between people to get back inside the house. Back to the warmth of his cocoon and the luminescent screen of his laptop.

If Scott was here, maybe he would be able to bring some life into Stiles. He’s stuck in traffic, though. Or, that’s what he told Stiles, who subsequently told Lydia. She received almost an identical text message from Allison so it’s highly doubtful that ‘traffic’ is at fault for their lateness. Especially considering a portion of Beacon Hills is still on vacation and at least two grades of Beacon Hills High students are currently inhabiting the Martin-Stilinski house.

Meaning, the duty falls to Lydia.

She can let him disappear into his bedroom, become one with his blankets once again and ignore the party that’s happening below. But she doesn’t want to.

Lydia drops the tray of cups on one of the unoccupied chairs and follows him. Her quick march, even in heels, matches his slow dawdle, letting her catch him before he can go any further than the kitchen. He almost drops his cup when Lydia pushes him against the counter, trapping him there with one of her arms.

“What the hell?” he asks, finally turning himself around to look at her.

“What are you doing?”

Stiles’ brow furrows. She can practically see the cogs in his brain moving together to concoct a believable lie. Honestly, it’s a little offensive that he still thinks he can successfully lie to her. Lydia purses her lips, her fingers tapping on the marble counter she has him against.

“I’m waiting,” Lydia says, keeping her eyes on him even when he focuses on something behind her, still attempting to fabricate a lie.

Finally, Stiles sighs, his gaze reluctantly returning to her. “It’s not like anyone would notice if I left.”

“I would.”

“You have all these people. My presence isn’t important”

Lydia can’t help it when her eyes roll, the exasperation practically rolling off her. “Yes, it is!”

Considering the number of people who turn to gawk at them, it comes out significantly louder than Lydia expected it to. The way Stiles’ entire expression shifts tells her that even he wasn’t expecting her to react like that. It’s not embarrassing, she won’t let it be. Lydia tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, plastering an almost saccharine smile on her face, and pulls her hand off the counter.

“Just talk to someone, Stiles.”

This time it’s Stiles who rolls his eyes. “ _Who_?”

Lydia takes it as a challenge. She turns on her heel, eyes scouring the interior of the house before moving to the exterior. Stiles moves to stand beside her and attempts to follow her ever-moving gaze. There’s a high likelihood that there are over one hundred people in their house but all Lydia needs is one person to push Stiles toward.

Then she finds her; _Malia_.

Friend of Kira’s. Possible transfer student. From what Lydia saw during their brief introduction, a good person capable of holding a conversation.

“Her,” Lydia asserts, motioning her head to Malia.

His jaw seems to clench for a moment before he downs the remnants of his drink. “I give myself two minutes.”

“I give you three,” she replies, shrugging her shoulder when he looks at her with confusion. “Maybe I believe in you.”

The statement makes Stiles smile. It’s momentary, fleeting, if her eyes hadn’t been so intently focused on him, she would have missed it. Lydia nudges him in the ribs, much less unenthusiastically than she assumes Scott would if he were here, and Stiles finally nods.

There’s a pang in the pit of her stomach as she watches Stiles introduce himself to Malia. Lydia ignores it, though, and returns to her host duties, because that was part of her agreement with Stiles. If it was his choice, people would just show up and do their own thing but Lydia liked to make sure that everyone was okay. There was a reason her birthday party was the biggest party of the year, it wasn’t only because her name was attached to it.

Lydia watches people arrive and leave, exchanges pleasantries with people whose names she doesn’t actually know and faces she doesn’t actually recognise. The party manages to become bigger than she expected but then it dawns on her that she never specified invite-only or left someone to guard the entry; Lydia’s surprised it’s not a larger party when that realization dawns on her.

Allison and Scott finally show up, not even attempting to hide what kept them occupied for the first half of the party. They join in with what’s happening effortlessly, which isn’t surprising, given that they’re the undisputed golden couple of Beacon Hills High; the friendliest, the cutest, the ones people adore. Lydia’s envious of them. Not of the romantic aspect of their relationship, but the fact that they both have someone to support them and keep anchor them. She has that with Allison but she’s still envious of what they have.

Cleaning as she goes leaves the house much tidier than the usual Saturday parties in Beacon Hills are at the end of the night. Lydia relies on guys from the lacrosse team, the ones who aren’t passed out on her living room floor, to escort the drunker people out as she searches the house for Stiles. Somewhere between the first person throwing up in the garden and the first in the hot tub, Lydia lost sight of him.

She doesn’t even think about it first when she swings his door open. The light from the hallway filters into the room, illuminating the darkness that was previously there, and allows her to see Stiles asleep under the covers with Malia curled up next to him.

And there it is again, the pang in the pit of her stomach.

The pang that Lydia tries to ignore when she shuts his door and walks back downstairs to help get the rest of the drunk people out of her house.

The pang that Lydia won’t admit is there even as she’s laying in bed, staring up at the ceiling, trying not to think about the two of them in the room opposite to her.

She tells herself that whatever the pang in her stomach is, it has to do with how she felt about Scott and Allison. Definitely not Stiles and Malia, who won’t last longer than the morning because it’s Stiles.

 

* * *

 

It lasts.

They, Stiles and Malia, last longer than the morning.

So does the pang in Lydia’s stomach.

 

* * *

 

The possibility of Malia being a transfer student becomes a certainty.

Which means that Lydia sees her and Stiles’ public displays of affection at her school as well as at her house, on her couch, in her kitchen, by her pool; it’s like no matter where she turns, she’s faced with them. It shouldn’t bother her, Stiles has had girlfriends before and Lydia’s been _friends_ with his girlfriends, despite not being friends with him. She has never felt anything remotely close to the pang that resides in her stomach whenever Lydia sees Stiles and Malia.

It occurs her as she sits nestled between Kira and Allison and watches Stiles and Malia argue about math. Or really, watches the way Stiles’ mouth moves when he talks, the way his tongue comes out to run along his bottom lip. All it does is remind her of how close they had been, leant over the Jeep, breathing each other in, and the realization comes to her. By that, Lydia means crashes into her like train and leaves practically no air in her lungs.

Rather than let her expression show that, Lydia thinks about certainties. The mathematics behind probability. Statistics that usually put her at ease. But then her mind wanders back to him as he stretches up and his shirt follows, exposing a trail of hair that disappears into his jeans.

Certain: Lydia Martin wants Stiles Stilinski.

Probable: Lydia Martin has deeper feelings for Stiles Stilinski that extend beyond wanting to have sex with him.

And uncertain?

The possibility that Lydia Martin will act on her feelings for Stiles Stilinski. _Especially_ when he has a girlfriend.

 

* * *

 

It’s not that she ignores her feelings for him, she just doesn’t let her actions be affected by them.

She doesn’t spend her free period imagining what it would be like to kiss him. She doesn’t find herself doodling ‘Lydia Stilinski’ in the margins of her notebooks when she’s supposed to be working. She doesn’t sit in her room and wait for him to burst through the door with a heartfelt speech about his feelings for her.

Lydia just does what she always did. The only difference is that she acknowledges she has romantic feelings for him.

 _Well_ , it takes a little longer to acknowledge that she has romantic feelings for him than it does to admit that she wants to fuck him, but Lydia does get there.

And all it takes to change that, to let her actions be affected by her feelings for Stiles, is for Malia to join them for dinner one night. It’s nothing she or Stiles say, or their actions, or anything Natalie or the Sheriff say; it’s just them. Somehow, it crawls under her skin and burrows itself in her.

So that night, after dinner, when the three of them go to Allison’s, Lydia ends up in bed with Isaac Lahey. How they do is a blur. She’s well aware she initiated it, pulling him down to her height, tasting stale beer on his tongue as he held her against the wall. She’s also well aware that Stiles’ eyes were on her when she initiated it. But it’s how they ended up back in her own bedroom, with her on top of him with eyes closed as she bounces, that’s a blur.

She expects him to leave when they’re done, that’s how it usually works in these situations. When he doesn’t, she braces herself for whatever’s about to be said but Isaac says nothing.

They both stare up at her ceiling, the only sound in the room being their practically synchronized breathing.

It’s oddly calming.

 

* * *

 

Wordlessly, it becomes a thing for them. They don’t talk about it beforehand, there’s no initial planning; they just start.

It’s a mutually beneficial distraction.

They don’t want anything more than that.

There’s no concern about either of them falling for the other because they’re both trying to distract themselves from who they really want. They don’t talk about _that_ either.

It’s good, having someone to distract her, because otherwise, she could have let her actions be affected by her feelings for Stiles.

But having Isaac underneath her at least once a week, it protects her from that. It’s like creating a moat to surround her walls or taming a dragon to circle the perimeters. It’s an added safety precaution.

She tells him that one night. He’s half-asleep, staring up at her ceiling like he normally does when they’re finished, and she’s on her side, staring at him like she normally does. Lydia likes looking at him, at his contours, at his muscles, at everything that most people aren’t normally privy to. There’s a sadness to him, hidden underneath a mask of apathy and sarcasm, and she can’t take her eyes off it.

“You’re my dragon,” Lydia whispers, it’s almost too soft to be heard, but she notices the way the corners of his lips turn upward in a small smile. There’s no malice in the smile, it’s the purest smile she’s ever seen him wear.

Maybe there’s more to it than a mutually beneficial distraction.

But Lydia knows that whatever that more is, it isn’t anything remotely close to love.

In another life, there’s a chance that she could fall in love with Isaac Lahey. It would probably be the simplest action she’s ever done. To fall seamlessly in love with the boy with the hidden sadness. But that’s not the reality she lives in and Lydia doesn’t do simple.

Even if she wanted to, she’s not the type of person who enjoys ‘ _simple_ ’.

 

* * *

 

“Do you know what you’re doing?”

It’s a simple question but it renders her utterly confused, staring down at the cup of coffee she’s been absent-mindedly stirring for the past few minutes for answers, before her eyes meet his. Stiles is leaning against the counter, bowl of cereal in his hand, scrutinizing her. There’s nothing in his expression that gives her any clue as to why he’s asking so Lydia decides on sarcasm as her response.

“I’m inhaling oxygen and exhaling carbon dioxide,” Lydia states, a smirk tugging on the corners of her lips. “If you want, I can be more technical. Do you want to know about the physiological mechanisms involved? The Inspiratory center? The Expiratory center? How about the Pneumotaxic center? The Apneustic center? The nasopulmonary--”

Stiles drops his bowl on the counter abruptly, interrupting her rambling sarcasm. “I saw Isaac sneaking in last night.”

Her smirk falters, her lips mashing together in a thin line briefly before she pushes her coffee cup away from her. “That’s none of your business, Stiles.”

“I live here too.”

“So do my mother and your father. If this conversation is about house rules and courtesy, shouldn’t they be here?”

“I think they’re a little busy,” he returns.

Just like they have been for a few weeks. Arguing in privacy, quiet in an attempt not to rouse worry, pretending that everything’s fine even though all four of them know exactly what’s happening.

Lydia sighs before narrowing her gaze, a deadly smile setting on her lips. “We’re not doing this.”

If she didn’t feel incredibly irritated by their conversation, Lydia would most likely find it commendable that Stiles follows her when she leaves the kitchenette. It’s certainly a brave choice of action, considering her current expression.

“You’re going to get hurt.”

“I’m perfectly capable of protecting myself,” Lydia snaps, not even bothering to look over at him as she takes her handbag.

Stiles is faster than her, reaching for her keys before she can, in an attempt to prolong the conversation. She doesn’t turn to face him, to make him hand over her keys, instead tapping her manicured nails on the wooden surface of the coffee table, waiting for him to make the logical deduction of what might happen if he doesn’t give them back.

He doesn’t.

“Isaac has feelings for Allison,” Stiles finally says, voicing it like it’s the worst possible news he can give her.

But it’s not.

It’s not even _new_ information.

She and Isaac both knew what they wanted when they started it. They’re distractions for each other. It’s not love or anything remotely close to that. What they have is purely beneficial; no emotions attached.

“Give me my keys, Stiles,” Lydia calmly demands, holding out her hand in wait.

Stiles yields and drops the keys on her palm. “I just don’t want to see you get hurt.”

There’s no possible way Lydia will get hurt; the walls she’s built around her can withstand any calamity.

 

* * *

 

After that, it goes back to the way it used to be.

Stiles and Lydia don’t like each other.

They barely tolerate each other.

 

* * *

 

When Stiles and Malia break up, Lydia watches from the sidelines.

Malia tells her that it was mutual. They weren’t working so it had to end.

From the way Stiles reacts, it wasn’t.

She doesn’t know what to say to him or whether she should speak to him at all. They haven’t spoken in weeks, not including the snarky comments they’ve shared while at parties or school, the retorts that are sharper than usual.

Which is why Lydia leaves it to Scott. Scott’s his best friend, he has been since elementary school. They know how to help each other because they’ve been through worse moments than a high school relationship ending. It seems like a perfectly reasonable idea to leave it to Scott.

At least until she hears him calling out to her from the second floor of Danny’s house.

They’ve been there for almost two hours. Lydia’s talking to Danny and his newest boyfriend, who says he has a twin who Lydia might like as well, when Scott beckons her upstairs, waving his arm around in a completely unsubtle movement that gains more attention than he probably wanted.

“What?” It’s sharper than she intends it to be as she climbs the stairs but Scott takes no notice.

He reaches for her hand, pulling her up the remaining two stairs and directs her to the bathroom. “I need you.”

From any other guy, Lydia would be concerned, pull away from him and maybe even physically respond. But it’s Scott. So, she just rolls her eyes and follows him as he enters the bathroom.

“To do wh...” Lydia trails off when she sees Stiles sitting against the bathtub, head lolling from side to side.

“To help with him,” Scott answers, taking his hand off Lydia’s to point at Stiles.

It’s like a burst of energy hits him. Stiles’ head snaps up, a giant smile stretching across his face before he spreads his arms out wide, narrowly missing the toilet. “Lydia! Scotty! You guys made it! Welcome to the VIP room!”

Lydia ignores him. Instead, turning her attention to Scott as she shakes her head. “Why do you need _my_ help, Scott?”

He looks almost sheepish, glancing between her and Stiles before his brow creases a little. “Allison said you were the designated driver tonight.”

It’s a decision she’s currently regretting.

One that she regrets even more as she and Scott put Stiles in her passenger seat and he begins to look queasy. Stiles plays it off, winking at her, before slurring, “Take a ride with me, Martin?”

Lydia shuts the car door with a roll of her eyes, ignoring whatever idiotic face Stiles is making towards Scott, and walks around to the driver’s side. Scott waves goodbye to the and Stiles is a little too overzealous when he returns the wave. He keeps waving until he can’t see Scott anymore, briefly pouting at the absence of his best friend. When his hand stops moving, his queasy look returns and Lydia has to turn her attention away from him, even though all she wants to do is watch him to make sure he doesn't vomit.

Because there _is_ a very real possibility that Stiles is actually going to throw up in her car, which would be worse than any stupid prank he ever played. It’s not even an irrational fear, there’s evidence to give her fear credibility. It’s the reason why she drives slower than she normally would, trying to avoid roads with bumps or anything that might make him vomit.

Lydia doesn’t let her eyes stray from the road. Not even when she feels his eyes on her, watching her as intently as he can with his drooped eyelids. Her grip genuinely tightens on the steering wheel in an attempt to not meet his gaze.

It’s good, though. If Stiles is looking at her, then he’s awake and if he’s awake, Lydia doesn’t have to come up with a way to wake him up when they get home or – and the possibility of this happening is much higher than him actually waking up when she tries to make him – having to drag his heavy, snoring body into the house and dropping him on one of the loveseats. She wouldn’t even try to make it up the stairs with him, that would no doubt wake up Natalie and the Sheriff and Lydia didn’t want to have that conversation.

Turning the radio on has the same effect that she assumes dunking his head in cold water would. Stiles, _loudly_ and _off-key_ , makes up words to go along with the rhythm of whatever song plays, using any surface he can as a makeshift drum kit.

It’s when the only song that Stiles knows the lyrics to comes on that Lydia arrives at the house. He actually pouts for a moment, silently pleading to stay for a little longer, but gets out. It’s unsteadily, he clutches onto her car almost immediately after he exits it and it’s only when Lydia wraps her arm around his waist, his arm resting around her shoulders, that he loses the queasy look he had begun to wear again.

Somehow, miraculously, they manage to make it up to his room in nearly complete silence. Halfway up the stairs, Stiles had loudly whispered that they needed to be quiet and it had reverberated through the house. But neither of their parents had checked the hallway so Lydia calls it a triumph.

Or _had_ until Stiles manages to drag her down with him as he falls on his bed. Lydia controls herself from releasing a noise of surprise and shoves his shoulder forcibly. That does absolutely nothing; he has her arm clutched to his chest, his back pressed against her front, and she's effectively become the big spoon.

“Stay.”

Her breath hitches. Stiles’ grip on her hand loosens enough for her to pull it away but she doesn’t, even though she knows she should. She has feelings for him, feelings that haven’t gone away despite the multiple nights spent with Isaac, and being close to him, it’s enough to magnify those feelings and make it impossible to ignore them.

But she deludes herself into thinking that it’s okay. That she can be there with him and forget everything. That for a while, she doesn’t have to distract herself or keep her walls up entirely.

Lydia takes her hand away from his chest and moves herself to lay opposite him. The only light in the room is the scattered glow from one of the streetlamps that’s sprinkling in through the half-open blinds. It’s enough though. Enough for her to see the small smile tugging on his lips. Enough for him to see her mirrored smile.

And when his hand moves from resting underneath his cheek to tuck strands of Lydia’s hair behind her ear, it hits her. No matter how deep the moat is or how determined the dragon is or how high her walls are, Stiles could get past them and Lydia would let him.

His hand lingers, fingers cupping her ear, and she wants nothing more than to lean into him. She can close her eyes and pretend that this is what they are. But they’re not. It’s bad enough that she stayed, she can’t do anything more. Lydia takes his hand off her and rests it back on the space between them.

“Go to sleep, Stiles.”

 

* * *

 

They wake up with their legs intertwined, his hand resting on her waist to pull her close to him, her hand resting on his arm to keep him close to her.

They don’t talk about it that day.

Or the next.

Or the next.

Or the next.

 

* * *

 

Danny’s boyfriend, Ethan, as Lydia quickly finds out when she arrives, and his brother, who’s name Lydia doesn’t actually hear when he introduces himself, take it upon themselves to continue the tradition of Saturday night parties.

Neither Lydia nor Stiles have been drinking yet they somehow find themselves in the circle of tipsy to drunk Beacon Hills High students, who are playing seven minutes in heaven. She isn’t entirely sure why they decided to do it but it’s better than a few of the other ideas this group have come up with while inebriated. The only reason Lydia had joined in was because Kira wanted to.

The game itself has some interesting results; Kira and Isaac end up together in the closet, Danny and Ethan (not exactly surprising, but it is cute when they exit wearing each other’s shirts), Malia and Jackson, Caitlin and Cora.

And then it happens.

Stiles reluctantly spins the bottle and it lands on Lydia.

There’s a few ‘ _ooh_ ’s followed by the people they’re sitting between pushing them until they both stand up and walk into the closet. Danny shuts the door behind them with a wink, leaving them in the pitch black, confined space for seven minutes.

Seven minutes of silence.

420 seconds of nothing but staring at the walls behind them and the sound of the party happening outside.

“How’s your boyfriend?” Stiles asks, breaking the silence, his gaze moving to her as he crosses his arms against his chest.

Lydia misses the silence already.

“He’s not my boyfriend.”

“Are you two still having sex?”

“Why do you care?”

He pauses for a moment before shrugging, the movement making the jackets beside him rustle. “I don’t.”

“Great,” Lydia utters. It takes about thirty seconds of considering it, how he doesn’t actually deserve to know and how she doesn’t need to explain herself but then she just gives in. “We’re not. Isaac and I... we stopped.”

Another pause from Stiles. One that seems to drag on until; “Why?”

That question echoes in her ears.

 _“Why_?”

 _“Why_?”

 _“Why”, Stiles_? _You’re smart; you figure it out_.

Lydia doesn’t even need to respond to him. They have at least five minutes left, 300 seconds, and then they can leave, avoid each other and not talk. That’s what they’ve been doing for the past week since they woke up together, for the past two months since he told her that he doesn’t want to see her get hurt, for the past two years since they stopped being friends. They can do avoidance and snark and pranks and end the year exactly the same way as they began. Those actions are like reflexes to them; like the knee-jerk reaction that comes from hitting the patellar ligament with a hammer.

But Lydia’s tired.

It’s exhausting to keep doing this. She has feelings for him, even though she has no idea why because he drives her insane half the time. It’s that other 50% percent, though. That 50% of the time when he makes her smile or laugh or feel something that she told herself she wouldn’t feel for anyone _ever_. Stiles is dangerous in that sense; the walls she built around herself can withstand any calamity but not him, he doesn’t swing a wrecking ball against them or tell her to tear them down and let him in, he somehow manages to climb up them and lean over the edge with that stupid smile of his.

_So, “Why”, Stiles?_

Her answer doesn’t come in verbal form. Actions speak louder than words after all.

She steps forward, closing what little space they had between them, and bundles the front of his flannel in her fists, bringing his lips down to hers. Lydia has no idea what she expected would happen but him freezing was definitely not planned. He just stands there, hands at his sides, and Lydia has no idea what to do.

No one has ever not done anything when she’s kissed them. No one.

It may not be anatomically possible but Lydia actually feels her heart sink. She pulls her lips away from his slowly, her fingers releasing their grasp on his shirt. There’s a likely chance they still have over half their allocated time in the closet left and Lydia’s certain that it will be the most incredibly awkward 4 minutes of her life, waiting in silence for someone to open the door. She can bang against the door but they’re taking the game incredibly serious so it’s unlikely they’ll open it until time’s up.

She can blame the heat of the moment for her actions. Or them being forced together for this stupid game. Or wanting to shut him up. They’re all viable options. All total lies, which Lydia _knows_ Stiles will know are lies, but her other option is laying out everything, telling him the truth about her feelings and judging by his reaction to her kissing him, that option would be awful.

When her fingers finally completely release his flannel, Lydia runs them through her hair, a shaky breath unintentionally leaving her. “Stiles, I’m--”

It happens faster than she can actually comprehend. His hands move to her hips, pulling her close to him, their lips meeting yet again. This time, though, neither of them are frozen, in spite of Lydia’s initial surprise at his actions. A fierceness takes over; her hands wrapping around his neck, his hands moving from her hips to the backs of her thighs to lift her up. Her back hits the door at the same time they pull away for air, their laboured breathing louder than the noise from the party outside.

“What--”

“Don't,” she says before kissing him again. Her thighs tighten around his hips, anchoring him against her, as her hands move up to his hair, fingers roaming through it. Stiles takes his hands off her thighs, one moving to rest against the door, the other trailing up her waist to cup her breast.

He pulls away from her lips, taking a moment to catch his breath, while he continues to knead her breast. “We’re in a closet with a time limit.”

Her head falls back against the door, her hips rolling against him in perfect harmonization with the movement of his hand. “I’m well aware, thank you.”

What sounds like a growl falls from Stiles’ lips. He begins meeting her hips as they move before dropping his head to the crook of her neck, licking, kissing and biting, in retaliation. Her fingers tug on the strands of his hair caught between them, which seems to spurn him on more.

“You should have told me earlier.” It’s muffled against her skin but Lydia still hears it. Her hands pull his head away from her neck. She stops rolling her hips, despite her own objections about doing so.

Even though it’s pitch-black in the room, Lydia thinks that their eyes meet. “How would that conversation have gone, Stiles?”

“ _Stiles, I have feelings for you_.”

“That’s presumptuous.”

“But true,” Stiles retorts before pausing, his hand leaving her breast. “Right?”

The worriedness in his tone causes her to nod her head and cup his cheeks. This is what she had Isaac for, to help keep her walls defended, to provide an extra layer of protection so she wouldn’t let her guard down. But this was what she knew Stiles would do, make it through regardless of the obstacles.

“Yes,” she says it so softly. It’s not even a whisper, it’s barely a breath. So Lydia nods her head again and again until Stiles kisses her, his hands moving to splay across her back, holding her as close to him as possible.

His mouth leaves her to trail kisses across her cheek and down her neck. He rests his cheek against her shoulder, his breath hitting her neck. “ _God_ , Lydia, you don’t know how long I’ve--”

There’s a knock on the door that startles both of them. Stiles’ head move away from Lydia while his hands drop down to her thighs, which Lydia’s thankful for because her legs loosen from around his hips and she almost falls on her ass.

“30 second warning,” Danny calls out and knocks on the door again. “We don’t care if your pants are off when we open the door but _you_ will.”

It’s enough time for them to untangle, readjust themselves and make it look like they _weren’t_ doing what they were doing. They end up standing opposite each other, arms crossed against their chests, looking almost exactly like they had when they entered seven minutes earlier.

No one can tell when they exit the room.

They’re the only two who know.

And they don’t say anything.

Not even to each other.

 

* * *

 

It’s been less than twenty-four hours since they were wrapped up in each other, meaning that it should be awkward to be sitting across from each other at dinner with their parents. It’s not, though. It feels like it always does.

They’re in the middle of talking about school when Lydia’s phone rings. Natalie is the first to look to her daughter, a frown settling on her face.

“Lydia, you know the rule, no phones at the dinner table.”

“I know,” Lydia responds, stopping herself from rolling her eyes, before reaching into her jacket pocket. She smiles when she sees the caller I.D. “It’s Dad. I’ll be two minutes, I promise.”

She leaves the table before Natalie can say anything else. Lydia knows what her mother will say, it’s the same thing that she always says when he calls and she’s around. Her parents seemed to have an unspoken rule about when they were allowed to start badmouthing each other to Lydia. The minute she started senior year their digs at each other became blatant, like they were worried Lydia will only choose to see one of them once she leaves high school and starts her own life away from Beacon Hills. All the badmouthing does is make her reluctant to see either of them or at the very least, not tell either of them when she sees the other.

Lydia sits on one of the pool chairs and answers the call. “Hi Dad.”

“Hi sweetheart,” he says. The tone of his voice makes her stomach drop, she knows what he’s about to say before he says it. “Lydia, I’ve been trying my hardest to find time to make it out there but work is busy right now. I can’t afford to take time away for--”

“Your daughter’s graduation?” she asks incredulously, even though it shouldn’t be a surprise because she knew. Her brows knit together as she shakes her head.

“Honey, I’m trying but... Have your mother video call me, it’ll be like I’m there.”

He’s trying. Lydia knows that he’s trying. That knowledge doesn’t make it easy to stop her eyes from watering. She swallows back any emotion and stops herself from hurling her phone into the pool, choosing to respond instead. “I’ll see you during the summer then.”

“Of course,” her father replies. She can almost see the smile he plasters on his face when he says, “I’m sorry, honey. I love you. We’ll talk soon.”

“Yeah,” she says before hanging up the phone.

Lydia stays on the pool chair, letting the chill night air cool her face and dry away the tears in her eyes. She has to make it through the house without crying. She hates crying in front of other people, even if they do share the same house. It’s not a big deal, anyway. Lydia had known from the beginning of senior year that there was a possibility that her father wouldn’t attend her graduation; that possibility had become a certainty and that’s okay.

When it feels like she doesn’t look like she’ll cry, Lydia stands and walks back into the house. The second she walks back to the table and all eyes are on her, she feels her eyes water again.

“Lydia, sweetheart?” Natalie says, dropping her cutlery.

Her fingers grip the phone into her hand until her knuckles are white. She uses her other hand to wave off her mother’s worried expression. “It’s fine. Dad is... He’s not coming to graduation. It’s fine... I’m just going to go to my room, I’m not really feeling very hungry anymore.”

Yet again, Lydia doesn’t wait for a response. She can already feel tears falling down her cheeks before she’s even reached the bottom of the stairs. She doesn’t want to do this with other people around. All she needs is a few hours then she can talk to her mother, the Sheriff, even Stiles, without crying.

She gets two minutes.

Two minutes of resting against her door, tears streaming down her face as shaky breaths leave her mouth, before there’s a knock at it.

“Hey Lydia.”

It’s Stiles, not her mother like she had expected. Still, she doesn’t want to talk to anyone so she wraps her hand around the doorknob, making sure he can’t open it. That doesn’t stop him from knocking again.

“Lydia, come on.”

“Just go away,” Lydia tries to shout but her voice breaks halfway. There’s a thud on the other side, which Lydia assumes is Stiles leaning his head against the door. “Stiles, I don’t need anyone seeing me cry.”

He sighs, head seeming to move against the door it’s leaning against based on the noise it makes. “Look, you shouldn’t care if people see you cry, alright? Especially _you_.”

In spite of better judgement, Lydia’s curious. Her grip loosening on the doorknob as her other hand wipes away the tears on her cheek. “Why?”

“Because I think you look really beautiful when you cry.”

It’s the honesty in his tone that pushes her off the door so that she can open it a little and look at him. The startled expression on his face from the action disappears when he sees her, his hand coming out instead for her to take while a smile settles itself in place of his surprise.

“Take a ride with me, Martin?”

And she does.

Lydia tells herself it’s so that she won’t have to worry about her mother or the Sheriff coming up to check on her, asking her questions she doesn’t want to answer, telling her that it’ll be okay. She knows it’ll be okay, it’s only graduation and her dad will be there in one form or another. But it’s the fact that she’s hardly seen her father in person since the divorce and that they talk to each other through impersonal means of communication like texts and emails more than they do over the phone or through video calls. Lydia thought that graduation would be different, maybe it would force her parents to realize they need to play nice and be amicable. And while, yes, she is upset that her own father won’t be there in person to watch her walk across that stage and listen to her valedictorian speech, Lydia’s more upset that it’s certain this is how it will continue to be with her parents and they won’t ever be able to stand being in the same room with each other for longer than a few minutes, or will but start bickering; that’s why Lydia’s crying.

Stiles says nothing as he drives, he just taps his fingers against the steering wheel, and lets her cry, which Lydia’s thankful for. The sound of the radio and the sound of her crying is what resonates in the Jeep, nothing else.

She doesn’t ask him where he’s going. She’s not even sure if he _knows_ where he’s going. At least until he brings the Jeep to a stop and Lydia forces herself to move her head out of her hands to see where they are.

It’s somewhere in the preserve. A spot where everything in Beacon Hills seems so small and insignificant. It’s just houses illuminated, street lamps glowing, moving lights that make the scene beautiful. Lydia glances away from it to Stiles, whose arms are crossed on top of the steering wheel, his chin resting on top, as he looks at the illuminated Beacon Hills.

Lydia wipes her cheeks, letting out a small sigh as she does. She looks away from him and reaches for the door handle, getting out without saying anything. There’s something about the bitter air that makes her feel better, even if it also makes her feel colder and wish she picked up a jacket before she left.

She leans against the Jeep, continuing to stare at Beacon Hills, while Stiles gets out. Without looking over at him, Lydia can sense his hesitance. He doesn’t know whether she wants company outside the Jeep – she does – or if she wants him to say anything – she does – or what to say if she does. So, Stiles leans next to her, his eyes staying on her instead of Beacon Hills like hers are. Without thinking, Lydia’s hand finds his, their fingers intertwining.

“Lydia...” he trails off when she looks over at him.

They don’t talk enough. They should talk more. There’s so many things that need to be said that haven’t been but she doesn’t want to talk or actively _not_ talk.

She leans up to press her lips to his. It’s not remotely close to the fierceness and desperation that had been there the night before. Their lips move together slowly and her focus is on that, not the fact that she’s never this delicate when she kisses someone or how natural it feels. They pull away from each other, their eyes meeting briefly, before Stiles shifts so that he’s in front of her, his thumb tracing circles on the back of her hand as he does.

When he looks like he’s about to say something, Lydia does it again; she takes the chance away by capturing his lips again. Their kiss deepens with the same delicateness of before as their tongues brush against each other. There’s no need to take it quickly, there’s no time limit hanging over them, there’s just them and the sound of nothingness.

But there’s still part of her that’s yearning for what they had at the party. She does want the fierceness, the desperation, the breathlessness that they had. Which is why she pulls away from his lips, disentangles their fingers and walks over to get in the Jeep. It’s only when she’s settled herself on the backseat that she realizes he’s still outside, still looking at her like this is all a dream. When she crooks her finger, telling him to join her without saying the words, a smirk tugs the corners of his lips up and he does.

It takes some manoeuvring but Lydia finds herself on top of him. Her hands grasp his shoulders as his roam her back. The desperation comes back, their lips crashing against each other until they have to pull away for air. She takes that opportunity to pull him forward to slide his flannel shirt off him.

He stares up at her, his hands moving back to rest on her thighs, thumbs drawing soft circles on her skin. “Lydia, what is--”

“Stiles, I have feelings for you,” she interrupts, copying the statement he suggested the previous night, before her hands find the hem of her dress and pull it over her head so she can throw it on the driver’s seat. “I can bare you my soul, tell you what movies make me cry, tell you _anything_ really... but I’m half-naked on top of you, do you really want to talk right now? Or do you want to put your hands somewhere useful?”

She means it them as rhetorical questions. They _both_ know that she means them as rhetorical questions. But it’s Lydia and Stiles so, of course, he takes one of his hands off her thighs to rub his chin like he’s actually contemplating his answer. Normally, Lydia would reprimand him for it but his other hand, the one left on her thigh, is slowly trailing up the inside of her thigh and liquefying her thoughts. She doesn’t let him know, doesn’t look away from his face, doesn’t let her breathing give her away, but she knows the moment his hand reaches its destination, he’ll feel the wetness beginning to pool between her legs. From the way the corners of his lips tug up in a sly smirk and his eyebrow quirks, he knows before his hand stops its movement.

She has to force herself to not let a whimper escape her when his fingers begin to faintly trace along her panties. Even when the dampening material that acts as a barrier between his fingers and the place Lydia is desperate for him to be becomes evident to both of them. He’s still acting like he’s thinking about it and she’s not about to give him the satisfaction of letting him know how much he’s affecting her, despite wanting nothing more than to rut her hips against his fingers and relieve the tension she’s feeling.

It’s only when his fingers slip beneath the material and the heel of his palm brushes against her clit that Lydia moans, giving in entirely. Her eyes close as she bites down on her bottom lip. Stiles’ other hand cups her breast, his thumb tracing over her nipple. She can feel his warm breath against her neck, which only further ignites the fire sweeping across her skin.

“ _So_ ,” Stiles says softly as he slips a finger inside her. “What movies make you cry?”

The earnest tone of his voice is what makes her eyes snap open. It’s for the sheer purpose of glaring at him and the grin that he’s wearing. Lydia tries to think of a witty retort but her mind goes blank when his finger starts moving and he presses his lips against hers.

It’s something she’s thought about more than she would like to admit; the first time she and Stiles have sex. Whether they would still be living under the same roof. Whether they would be in college, seeing each other at a mutual friend’s party and soon after tearing each other’s clothes off in the nearest room. Whether they would be at different points in their life but find themselves back at Beacon Hills for something, a reunion maybe, and decide to see what could have been. Lydia’s even imagined a scenario in the rain, where the tension builds up until they finally can’t take it anymore and run into each other’s arms; Lydia blames The Notebook for that version. The point is that each version has had an element of drama to it, whether she intended it to or not, because drama seemed most likely given their circumstances.

As it turns out, it’s not.

Being in the back of the Jeep, her arms wrapped around his neck while his hands splayed against her back, with her head buried in the crook of his neck and his buried in the crook of hers, both of them breathing each other’s names like prayers interweaved with moans and curses, while they fuck each other; it’s not dramatic at all.

They’re giving themselves to each other. Lydia’s giving herself to Stiles. This is it. This is what she wants. She wants him and everything that comes with that, the good, the bad, _everything_.

“I fucking love you,” he says, muffled against her skin, as his thrusts become more urgent and erratic.

She keeps her forehead pressed to his neck, letting it stifle her cry as she comes. Stiles quickly follows, holding onto her like she’s the only thing keeping him grounded. Their heavy breathing takes the place of their moans, although Lydia thinks that the sound of her heart thumping against her chest must be deafening to Stiles as well.

Lydia waits until he’s taken the used condom off and put it somewhere else, until they’ve both gotten redressed, until he’s sitting against the wall of the Jeep, with his legs outstretched across the backseat, and her back is against his chest, until he’s absently tracing patterns on her arm, before she brings it up.

“You love me?”

“No,” Stiles replies. He must feel her stiffen because he stops tracing patterns on her skin and wraps his arms around her waist. “No, I _fucking_ love you, Lydia. With everything I’ve got.”

Her head turns to the side so she can look at him, her arms covering his. “Stiles--”

“I don’t need you to say it back,” Stiles interrupts. It makes her heart clench, the honesty that he’s showing her. “I just needed you to know.”

 

* * *

 

Natalie and the Sheriff break up a few weeks before graduation.

No one’s really surprised by it but they pretend they are.

Everyone’s more surprised by how amicable it is.

Except Stiles and Lydia, they sort of expected it to be.

They don’t tell their respective parent about their newfound relationship; they all have bigger issues to worry about.

Like the Sheriff and Stiles moving out of the Martin house.

Like Natalie trying to sell Lorraine’s lake house.

Like college.

 

* * *

 

Lydia’s going to Stanford. So is Stiles.

Scott’s going to USC.

Allison and Danny are going to Berkeley.

Kira and Isaac are going to NYU.

And Malia’s going to UCLA.

 

* * *

 

No one notices them at prom.

No one sees how close they’re dancing.

Or the way Stiles keeps his hand on the small of the back for most of the night.

Or how Lydia drags him into one of the empty classrooms and takes advantage of the seclusion.

It’s not how she pictured senior prom; it’s better.

Especially the after-party, when everyone’s too focused on what they’re doing, to pay any attention to Lydia and Stiles publicly acting like the couple they’ve privately been for almost a month.

When they’re at college, it’ll be easier. They can say they fell into each other, that it was sudden and unexpected, not that they started dating when they lived across the hall from one another and were able to sneak in to the other’s room in the dead of night to fall asleep together or fuck or both.

For now, they take the chances where they can.

 

* * *

 

Lydia thinks it’s Stiles who’s cheering the loudest after her Valedictorian speech. It makes a blush spread across her cheeks when she hears his hollering cut through the rest of the applause. Her eyes find him in the midst of graduation gowns and caps and she smiles, not even attempting to stop the small laugh that falls from her mouth when she sees the proud grin he’s wearing.

She finds her mother afterwards, who’s surprisingly in the middle of what seems like a pleasant video chat with her father. Then comes the photos. The ones where she’s alone, then the ones with Allison, with Stiles, with Danny, with the rest of their group of friends.

Natalie waves goodbye to her daughter before turning her attention back to her conversation with Melissa McCall. Lydia’s thankful for that because it means her mother doesn’t see her walk to the parking lot where the Jeep is parked. She settles herself on the hood, swinging the keys she took from Stiles when he wasn’t looking on her index finger.

From the other side of the parking lot, Lydia can see Stiles pause whatever animated debate he’s in with Scott and Isaac, his over-gesticulating hand movements ceasing as fear sets in and he hurriedly begins to pat down his pockets. When his eyes land on the Jeep and notice her, all appearance of fear disappears. He pats Scott and Isaac on the back, yelling something about seeing them at Danny’s later while he jogs toward her.

Lydia slides herself off the hood, landing on the bitumen by the time Stiles has closed the distance between them.

“You stole my keys.” He’s not mad, almost impressed actually.

She doesn’t say anything in response. Instead, she chooses to walk over to the driver’s side and lean against it, the keys still swinging around her finger. It’s when his eyebrow arches that a smirk graces her lips.

“Take a ride with me, Stilinski?”

Stiles chuckles before nodding his head. “I thought you’d never ask.”

One day, she’s going to tell him she loves him. She’ll vocalize what he already knows. But for right now, this is enough for him.

That’s what makes it a certainty that she’ll tell him.

**Author's Note:**

> did you enjoy it? i hope you did. it was the result of episode 5x03 and writer's block regarding my works in progress.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [i think it's called love](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5470991) by [LaughingSenselessly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LaughingSenselessly/pseuds/LaughingSenselessly)




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